1,001 Facts That Will Scare the S#*t Out of You: The Ultimate Bathroom Reader (102 page)

Jerome Goddard, Physician’s Guide to Arthropods of Medical Importance, 5th ed. (CRC Press, 2007).

769

FACT :
One of the largest terrestrial insects in North America, the wheel bug attacks by piercing the prey’s skin with a large beak and
injecting it with a flesh-dissolving poison
. Being bitten by a wheel bug is excruciating for humans, and the wound can take weeks to heal.
That’s just how wheel bugs roll, yo.

Stephen Welton Taber and Scott B. Fleenor, Insects of the Texas Lost Pines (Texas A&M University Press, 2003).

770

FACT :
Bee assassin bugs have hairs on their legs that allow them to catch and hold onto their prey.

Though named for their penchant for killing bees, assassins are opportunistic and attack many other insects,
immobilizing prey with a powerful, fast-acting toxin
. Their bite is more painful to humans than bee and wasp stings.
You’ve probably heard of would-be assassins, but not bee assassins. Don’t confuse would-be assassins with insects aspiring to become bee assassins; those are called would-be bee assassins.

Maurice Burton and Robert Burton, International Wildlife Encyclopedia, 3rd ed. (Marshall Cavendish, 2002).

771

FACT :
The bite of some assassin bugs found in the Sinai and Negev deserts of Israel is
more toxic than the bite of venomous snakes
in the region.
Hopefully this doesn’t ruin anyone’s vacation plans.

Lance A. Durden, Medical and Veterinary Entomology, 3rd ed. (Academic Press, 2002).

772

FACT :
Kissing bugs usually prey on bed bugs but will suck blood from humans, too. They earn their sweet name in a not-so-sweet way:
by biting the lips, eyelids, and ears of sleeping human victims
, causing intense pain that can last weeks or even months.
Kissing bugs are not the same as Ass-Kissing bugs, which do not bite but will continuously lick and nibble the hindquarters of anyone in authority.

Howard Garrett and C. Malcolm Beck, Texas Bug Book: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, 2nd ed. (University of Texas Press, 2005).

773

FACT :
Kissing bugs carry a deadly sleeping sickness, Chagas disease, which infects ii million people in Latin America,
many of whom do not know they are infected
. Without treatment the condition is lifelong and can be fatal.
Similar to Chagas disease is Jag-Ass disease, which affects millions of people all over the world, most of whom are aware of their infection but don’t give a damn.

If untreated, the condition is lifelong and can be fatal.

Howard Garrett and C. Malcolm Beck, Texas Bug Book: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, 2nd ed. (University of Texas Press, 2005).

774

FACT :
The most dangerous insect in the world is the mosquito, responsible for the spread of malaria, which infects 350–500 million people each year, killing as many as a million. There are
2,500 species
of mosquitoes throughout the world; about 200 of them occur in the United States.
All of them in my backyard.

Eric R. Eaton and Kenn Kaufman, Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2007).

“Malaria,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,
www.cdc.gov
.